


Carte Blanche

by Paraphilia



Category: Snow White - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Dark, Drama, Emotional Manipulation, Evil, F/F, Femslash, Fractured Fairy Tale, Incest, Kissing, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Motherhood, POV First Person, Parent/Child Incest, Seduction, Step-parents, Yuletide 2007
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-22
Updated: 2013-07-22
Packaged: 2017-12-20 23:44:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/893301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paraphilia/pseuds/Paraphilia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>My daughter, snow-white and impervious, has always known how to charm a man. Even as a child, she had simply to curve her faery smile for the Ritz bellboys to stutter and flush. I told myself, then, that she was innocent. That the evil lay not in her but in those that desired her; that her flirtations were girlish games and would fade with time. I was certain that she would grow as my hands moulded her, and that she would blossom within my care, young and soft and entirely mine.</p><p>What a fool I was.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Carte Blanche

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Brigdh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brigdh/gifts).



My daughter, snow-white and impervious, has always known how to charm a man. Even as a child, she had simply to curve her faery smile for the Ritz bellboys to stutter and flush. I told myself, then, that she was innocent. That the evil lay not in her but in those that desired her; that her flirtations were girlish games and would fade with time. I was certain that she would grow as my hands moulded her, and that she would blossom within my care, young and soft and entirely mine.  
  
What a fool I was.  
  
My Blanche is no white rose. She is, instead, an evening orchid -- wild and dark-scented, drawing many a collector's eye. Witness tonight, for example. A Friday night at our holiday mansion, with the chandeliers polished and lit. It's her father's re-election party. I mingle with the society ladies, as expected, and Blanche wanders carelessly among the sharks. Never too far from me; I've trained her to stay within reach, always, where I can glide in and retrieve her if necessary.  
  
I watch from the sidelines, which I've been relegated to since Blanche's debut. That was two years ago; she's rather skilled now, no longer floundering at over-eager compliments, no longer blushing when dignitaries forget their poise. She's stunning. Media moguls and politicians make fools of themselves, hanging helplessly on her every word. Such glittering things they promise her -- front-page appearances on their magazines and intimate dinners with movie stars. All perfectly appropriate, of course -- this old man has a niece who needs the company, and that journalist has a viable excuse to interview the senator's daughter. But their eyes are hungry, and Blanche knows it. Her hands curl into loose little fists, and she dips her lashes and purses her mouth.  
  
Mouth. That mouth.  
  
Sheer witchery.  
  
I herd her away from them, as planned, when the casual questions ("Will you follow your father into politics?") become rather more personal ("So do you have a boyfriend, Blanche?"). She clings to me and dares to look  _grateful_. As if she didn't want -- as if she --  
  
Their eyes, eyes that had once lingered on me, now see only her. I'm the senator's missus, nothing more. The painted shadow at her daughter's gleaming shoulder. The black star to Blanche's sun.  
  
"Mother," she whispers, while we're still in the hall, and when I pull her onto the balcony, "Mama."  
  
"What is it, dear?" I make as if to fix her hair, to smooth her dress. The heat of young skin through satin.  
  
"Thank you for rescuing me." Her lovely smile turns wry. "You know I hate it when they do that."  
  
"Of course you do." Lying little nymph. My hand finds the curve of her cheek and fits to it, as perfectly as it used to when she was five. "You do know that if anyone gives you trouble, you're to call for me?"  
  
"I'll always call for you." Wide eyes, luminous and infinitely trusting. Surely this is mere pretense. I'm not her real mother. She knows that. "Just you, Mama."  
  
I stand still in the night breeze, listening to the hum of voices from within the hall, muted by the heavy curtains that hide the balcony. I listen, also, to the deceit in her voice -- she's still too young to have mastered it, although she's had years to imitate me.  
  
Her seductions are as yet imperfect. They may work on the starving hounds that are her father's friends, but they won't  _quite_  work on me. Not yet.  
  
When I return her smile and tilt her chin up to kiss her, she thinks she's won. She allows me to taste her, as she always does, with a hint of condescension in her smile -- it moves against my mouth, complacent, but fades when my tasting turns earnest.  
  
Ah, that vanishing smile. She's frightened. Perhaps aroused. Her tongue doesn't quail against mine, but then, it never did -- she's danced this dance many times, with myself as her tutor, and she's never balked or cried.  
  
Her shoulders are bare under my palms. A strapless dress. Much too adult for one so young; I'll have to have a word with her tailor.  
  
"Mama," she says again, when I draw away. Her voice is hushed. Her eyes are dark, like put-out lamps.  
  
Good. This is how I like her -- honest, hesitant, without the veneer of composure to hide her faults.  
  
"The second sentence," I tell her, because I must. "You overdid it."  
  
"What?"  
  
Adorable. Adolescent and baffled -- has she forgotten that this is a lesson?  
  
" _Just you, Mama,_ " I echo, and bring my fingers to her face. Still warm, still flushed. "You overdid it, darling. Some things are best left unsaid."  
  
She really should have realized this on her own. I remember reading her the story of  _The Magic Paintbrush_ , a few years ago -- a seduction, like a painting, must be left one brushstroke away from completion. Too much perfection spoils it, and the subject (of the painting, of one's lust) flees, brought to life and self-awareness and the need to escape.  
  
Perhaps I'll tell her later. Once the party ends.  
  
"Yes, Mother," Blanche says, and it's  _Mother_  now, not  _Mama_ , because she's remembered her place.  
  
I almost regret it. Almost, but not quite. It's Blanche's fault, after all; she grew up to be an orchid, made for the harvest of many hands, and I had to prime her for the plucking.  
  
She must be accustomed to it. It shouldn't surprise her, or unnerve her, or affect her deeper thoughts -- those she must keep within herself, tight as a bud, untouched.  
  
Her thoughts are untouched now -- shielded again, beneath the fall of her hair as she bends her head, as she presses her own hand to her mouth. Not rubbing, not wiping. Better than she was a year ago.  
  
When we re-enter the hall, the patina of her charm is flawless once more, and the sharks turn to her as if scenting blood, their smiles widening over too-even teeth. I release my grip on her elbow and she steps into the crowd, looking clear and pearl-pure and perfect. Not at all overwhelmed by the fact that she's under siege.  
  
My pretty little fortress. I've armed her well.  
  
When one of the waiters walks past me, I help myself to the wine; even the waiter's eyes are fixed on her, poor hapless fool, and my lips twitch against the rim of my glass. The wine is nearly as soft as her mouth. I close my eyes to savor it. Thinking back. Remembering, because it seems important.  
  
What did my Blanche taste like? The sweetness of youth, of course, laced with something bitter...  
  
Poison.  
  
Oh, yes. Poison. Finally. How many years have I fostered it? Laced my words with it, and my touches, until she saw only me? My sapling child, still in her first bloom, was growing too fond of others. Naturally, I had to keep her from them. Had to teach her who she belonged to.  
  
That bitterness is where I've staked my claim. My own dark territory in Blanche's mirror-bright mind -- there, I am still the fairest of them all, the most perfect, the most sublime.  
  
At least to her. If only to her.  
  
When I open my eyes, it's to a flood of laughter and light -- with Blanche at the center of it, glowing, too young for her strapless dress.  
  
Snow-white. Impervious.  
  
Just as she used to be.  
  
 **Fin.**


End file.
